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Friday, March 4, 2016

Feast Your Eyes: Handmade ravioli recipe

This may come as a surprise, but making your own fresh pasta is a lot easier than you think! And no, you don’t need an expensive KitchenAid for the endeavor — just some semolina flour, eggs, and a rolling pin. Oh and wine, lots of wine!

I learned this first-hand when I took Bellina Alimentari’s filled pasta-making class. Check out the full process in the pics below and sign yourself up for a class! It’s super hands-on, which means you participate in every step of the process, and dinner is included — you eat what you make! Plus, you get to take home a ball of freshly made pasta dough to practice your awesome new skills the following night.

Start with a 1:1 mixture of white and semolina flour (100g each) and 1 egg per 100g flour

After making a dome with your flour, pour the eggs into the center and begin to mix it all together (c) Andrew Thomas Lee

Mix and kneed with the palm of your hand until you have a round non-sticky ball of dough and let sit for 30 minutes

Now it's time to roll the dough out! You can use a fancy machine or a plain ole' rolling pin

If using the machine, keep running it through until the dough reaches the desired texture -- not too thick, but not too thin

You should end up with a realllllly long ribbon of dough! Now, just cut into squares with a knife

Place one square of dough ribbon onto a ravioli mold and gently press it into the cups

Stuff with your favorite filling! The chef prepared a butternut squash filling with goat cheese for us

Place a second sheet of pasta ribbon on top of the filled cups, seal with egg, and roll the pin to cut out individual ravioli

TA-DA! Homemade ravioli!

If you prefer not to use a mold, you can stuff and cut the ravioli by hand

Fresh pasta cooks very quickly, in 3-4 minutes, so start your sauce first

Buon appetito!

I meant it when I said you don't need fancy/expensive equipment to make pasta from scratch, but it does make the process easier. If you're looking for some recommendations, here are my favorite must-haves: